Medical News

Binge drinking can weaken the body’s ability to fight infections for at least 24 hours, say U.S. researchers.

Binge drinking is defined as consuming large amounts of alcohol over a short period of time to deliberately get drunk.

In experiments with mice, the researchers found that binge drinking affects toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4), a protein that plays an important role in immune system activation. Specifically, heavy drinking suppresses TLR4’s ability to send signals that activate production of inflammatory cytokines — signaling molecules that begin the inflammatory response to infection.

The researchers also determined that binge drinking inhibits NF-B, a protein complex that controls DNA transcription and expression of some of the cytokines inhibited by alcohol.

“The time frame [after binge drinking] during which the risk of infection is increased might be at least 24 hours,” study author Stephen Pruett, of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Mississippi State University, said in a news release. “A persistent effect of ethanol on cells is indicated, such that inhibition of the response of some cytokines occurs even after the ethanol is cleared” from the body.

Two new blood tests could help doctors detect colon and stomach cancers simply, cheaply and early without the need for invasive procedures or unpleasant examinations, researchers said on Monday.

The tests, one developed by the Belgian biotech firm OncoMethylome and another by scientists in Germany, use blood samples to detect specific genetic signals of the disease and could help predict whether it is likely to spread.

Ernst Kuipers, a specialist in bowel cancer at Rotterdam’s Erasmus University, who was not involved in the research, said the new tests marked a promising advance in the field of developing more convenient screening.

“The blood sample can be taken by nurses or primary care doctors without the need for special equipment or training,” Joost Louwagie of OncoMethylome said.

Ulrike Stein, who presented her findings with Louwagie’s at the ECCO-ESMO European cancer congress in Berlin, said hers was the first test to be able to detect signals of a specific gene, called S100A4 and known to be linked to cancer, in the blood.

Stein’s test finds various types of cancer, including colorectal and gastric cancers, and had also shown potential in identifying patients whose cancer was likely to spread.

“Cancer patients have significantly higher levels of this S100A4 gene than people without cancer,” she said. “Being able to detect this gene in the blood of the patient, you can monitor the disease course and you can continue to monitor it over several years and throughout various treatments.”

Colorectal cancer effects around one in every 17 people and is the second leading cause of cancer death in the United States and Europe, where a total of 560,000 people develop the disease each year, and 250,000 die from it.

Deaths can be reduced if the cancer is diagnosed early, when it is most treatable.

Although current tests such as a colonoscopy internal examination or the analysis of stool samples are effective, they can be invasive, expensive and unpleasant.

Stein and colleagues from the ECRC Charite University of Medicine and the Max-Delbrueck-Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin looked at daily blood samples from 185 colon cancer patients, 190 with rectal cancer and 91 gastric cancer patients. They also analyzed blood from 51 tumor-free volunteers.

They found a signal of the gene at significantly higher levels in those with the cancers. There were even higher levels in patients whose cancer had spread.

Louwagie’s team collected blood before surgery from 193 patients known to have colorectal cancer, and from 688 people being screened using a colonoscopy internal examination.

They looked for two so-called methylation genes, SYNE1 and FOXE1, known to be linked to the formation of tumors, and found high levels in colorectal cancer patients, Louwagie said.

OncoMethylome said in August it was in advanced talks with several large companies over licensing rights to its colorectal test..

Gene variants on chromosome 2 are associated with glaucoma in blacks, say researchers who studied 129 patients with the vision-robbing disease.

The finding may lead to new treatments or a cure, the scientists added.

Glaucoma is the leading cause of blindness among blacks, affecting close to 5 percent of the population. There is no cure or way to reverse glaucoma, which causes the gradual and irreversible loss of peripheral vision. But reducing intra-ocular pressure can slow the progression to blindness.

“The cause and progression of glaucoma are poorly understood, although we know there is a strong genetic predisposition to the disease,” study co-author Dr. Robert N. Weinreb, director of the Hamilton Glaucoma Center and a professor of ophthalmology at the University of California, San Diego, said in a school news release.

This study included people in Barbados, where the incidence of glaucoma is nearly 10 percent (double the overall rate for blacks) because of a strong genetic influence.

“We have now identified very common gene variants that have a dramatic impact on an individual’s risk for developing glaucoma,” Dr. Kang Zhang, director of the Institute for Genomic Medicine and a professor of ophthalmology and human genetics at the Shiley Eye Center at UCSD, said in the news release.

“These gene variants are present in 40 percent of individuals with glaucoma in the Barbados population and explains nearly one-third of their genetic risk for the disease. This study should give us a better handle on earlier diagnoses and new therapies,” Zhang said.

“Once we understand the specific gene or protein structure that is altered in the disease, we are one step closer to developing gene or stem cell-based therapies to treat glaucoma,” Zhang noted.

The study appears in this week’s online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration violated procedures last year when it approved a knee repair device even though its own scientists recommended against approval, agency officials said Thursday.

The device, called Menaflex, is made by New Jersey-based ReGen Biologics and is used to help surgically repair knee damage — specifically, damage to the meniscus. But, a report released by the agency Thursday found that some FDA scientists had recommended against approval.

“There were numerous departures from processes, procedures and practices, and there were problems with the review process for the device,” Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, the FDA’s principal deputy commissioner, said during an afternoon teleconference.

In addition, the FDA report noted that four New Jersey Democratic lawmakers — Senators Robert Menendez and Frank Lautenberg and Representatives Frank Pallone Jr. and Steven R. Rothman — made inquiries to agency officials about the device’s approval status.

“Members of the delegation apparently had conversations with the [FDA] commissioner and at least one conversation with the [former] principal deputy commissioner,” the report said.

Going forward, the FDA plans to review the process by which such medical devices are approved, Sharfstein said. “It will also include a reevaluation of the clearance of this device,” he said.

However, there are no plans to remove the Menaflex device from the market, officials said.

“This device has been approved by the FDA, and we have no basis to question the safety of this device so it will remain on the market,” Dr. Jeffrey Shuren, acting director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said during the teleconference.

“What we have concluded is that the integrity of our process for reaching a decision was compromised in this case, so we are revisiting and evaluating the record and the bases for making that decision,” he said.

Sharfstein said that consumers should not worry if they have a Menaflex device.

He also said the FDA is looking to refine a procedure that would mediate differences among agency personnel when approving medical devices.

On Wednesday, responding to criticism of its safety review record, the FDA asked the U.S. Institute of Medicine to examine the approval process for certain medical devices. Specifically, the institute will look at an approval process called a 510k review procedure. This allows companies to immediately introduce products similar to ones already on the market. Menaflex was approved under this process, according to the FDA.

The 510k process is supposed to speed up approval of medical devices such as wheelchairs and bandages, but it has also been used to approve devices such as heart implants and hip replacements.

Surgery is slightly better than non-surgical treatment for patients with carpal tunnel syndrome who don’t have severe nerve damage (denervation), new research has found.

The study included 44 patients who had surgery and 52 patients who had non-surgical treatment, such as hand therapy and ultrasound. A year after treatment, the patients’ hand function was measured using the Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Assessment Questionnaire (CTSAQ).

The patients who had surgery showed an advantage in both function and symptoms — calculated by proportions of patients having at least 30 percent improvement in CTSAQ scores for these indicators, and having minimal interference in daily work or household activities. The study found that 46 percent of surgery patients and 27 percent of non-surgery patients met all three criteria.

“Overall, these data indicate that, in patients with carpal tunnel syndrome without denervation, surgery modestly improves hand function and symptoms by three months compared with a multimodality non-surgical treatment regimen, and this benefit is sustained through one year,” wrote Dr. Jeffrey Jarvik, of Harborview Medical Center at the University of Washington in Seattle, and colleagues.

“However,” they continued, “some patients allocated to surgery reported persistent symptoms, and 61 percent of patients allocated to non-surgical treatment avoided surgery altogether. Our study, together with previous evidence, indicates that surgery is useful for patients with carpal tunnel syndrome.”

The study appears online Sept. 24 in a special surgery issue of The Lancet.

Patient treatment preference is an important factor, two Swedish doctors noted in an accompanying editorial. When patients are “faced with the need to wear a splint each night and during daytime for some weeks, some might prefer early surgery while others may prefer partial recovery to potential surgical risk,” wrote Dr. Isam Atroshi and Christina Gummesson, both of Lund University.

“Nevertheless, patients with carpal tunnel syndrome who do not have satisfactory improvement with non-surgical treatment should be offered surgery,” the editorialists concluded.

Another study in the special surgery issue of The Lancet found that placing a drain in the skull after surgery reduces the risk of death and recurrence among patients with chronic subdural hematoma, in which blood collects under the dura, the outer protective membrane that covers the brain.

After surgery to drain the blood, between 5 percent and 30 percent of patients have recurrence of chronic subdural hematoma and require redrainage, Peter Hutchinson of Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, U.K., and colleagues noted.

In the study, the researchers assessed 215 patients, aged 18 years and older, with a chronic subdural hematoma who were treated using the burr-hole surgery technique. Of those patients, 108 had a plastic drain inserted a few centimeters into the subdural space after surgery. The drain was left in for a few days.

Subdural hematoma recurred in 10 of 108 people (9.3 percent) with the drain and in 26 of 107 (24 percent) of patients without the drain. After six months, 8.6 percent of patients in the drain group and 18.1 of those in the non-drain group had died, the researchers reported.

That friend who stays thin despite eating anything and everything is not just annoying. She might also wreck your diet, new research suggests.

Researchers found that when they had college students watch a movie and snack with either a skinny or overweight companion, the students typically followed the thin friend’s lead when she overindulged.

In contrast, study participants used more self-control when snacking with a heavier companion who overate.

The findings, published in the Journal of Consumer Research, suggest that seeing a thin friend devour a big meal gives us implicit permission to do the same.

“We think ‘if she can eat like that and stay thin, so can I,’ or ’she is having cake, then I can too,’” explained Dr. Brent McFerran, an assistant professor of marketing at the University of British Columbia in Kelowna, Canada.

“In other words,” he told Reuters Health in an email, “the most dangerous person to eat with is not someone who is obese, but a thin friend with a large appetite.”

For their study, McFerran and his colleagues recruited 210 female college students for what the participants believed was a study on movie viewing; each woman watched a movie with a companion, who was actually a member of the research team.

In some cases, the researcher showed up as her normal 105-pound self, while in others she donned padding that made her appear to be obese.

During the movie, the pairs were offered snacks, with the undercover researcher taking her portion first.

In general, McFerran’s team found, the students ate more when their thin companion took a large portion, versus cases where the “obese” companion took a similarly large portion.

For example, when the skinny researcher ate a lot (30 candies), the participants ate an average of 10 candies. When the researcher was “obese” and ate a lot, the kids ate about 6 candies.

“Eating involves much social pressure,” McFerran said, noting that social influences may, in fact, be the strongest predictor of what we eat.

But the current findings do not mean that we need to cancel all future dinner plans with our overindulgent skinny friends.

“If we think about what we are doing in advance,” McFerran said, “we are less likely to overconsume.”

He suggested that instead of looking at a thin friend who is gorging on dessert and feeling permission to do the same, we should remind ourselves that individuals are different — with different metabolisms and exercise habits, for example.

Focus on your own goal to eat healthfully, McFerran said, rather than automatically mimicking a friend.

He pointed out, however, that there is a “flip side”: Friends who choose smaller portion sizes and healthier foods can encourage us to do so, especially if those friends are thin.

An article published Online First and in a future edition of The Lancet reports that high blood pressure (hypertension) causes more than 1 million premature deaths in China, and over 2 million total deaths. This makes it the leading preventable cause of death in the country. It is essential for the Chinese government to focus on prevention and control of hypertension, and make it its top public health priority. Primary prevention will be a vital tool in such efforts. This includes reducing the enormous average daily salt intake and lifestyle modification. The article is the work of Prof Jiang He, of the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, New Orleans, LA, USA, and colleagues.

In 2000, it was estimated that 972 million adults, or 26.4 percent of the world’s adult population, had hypertension. In 2025, the number of adults with hypertension is predicted to increase by 60 percent to 1.56 billion. However, these estimates do not include pre-hypertension which is a slightly raised blood pressure that does not qualify as ‘full’ hypertension. The authors in this study estimated premature deaths attributable to increased blood pressure in China. They studied a nationally representative sample of around 170,000 Chinese adults aged 40 years and older. At a baseline examination in 1991, blood pressure and other risk factors were measured. Follow-up assessment was done in 1999 and 2000. Premature death was defined as mortality before age 72 years in men and 75 years in women since those were the average life expectancies in China in 2005.

Hypertension and pre-hypertension were significantly linked with increased all-cause and cardiovascular mortality. In 2005, an estimated 2.3 million cardiovascular deaths were attributable to increased blood pressure in China including 2.1 million in adults with hypertension and 0.2 million in adults with pre-hypertension. Also, 1.3 million premature cardiovascular deaths were attributable to raised blood pressure in China including 1.2 million in adults with hypertension and 0.1 million in adults with pre-hypertension. Most blood pressure-related deaths were caused by cerebrovascular diseases with 1.9 million of total deaths and 1.1 million of premature deaths.

The authors explain: “Our results show that raised blood pressure is the leading preventable risk factor for premature deaths in China… The enormous mortality burden related to blood pressure that we have documented is striking and unexpected compared with previous estimates.”

The researchers underline the fact that the prevalence of hypertension is high and increasing in the Chinese population. On the other hand, the proportion of awareness, treatment, and control is low. An earlier national survey indicated that approximately 153 million Chinese adults aged 18 years or older met criteria for diagnosis of hypertension. Only 24 percent of them were aware of their condition and 19 percent were receiving antihypertensive drugs. It is alarming that adequate control of blood pressure (<140/90 mm Hg) was achieved only in 24 percent of patients receiving treatment or less than 5 percent of all hypertensive patients.

The authors comment: “Dietary sodium intake is very high in China, so lifestyle modification, especially reduction of dietary sodium, should be an effective approach for primary prevention. The enormous burden of mortality attributable to blood pressure calls for a national policy to emphasise prevention and control of hypertension as the top public health priority.”

They write in conclusion: “Traditionally, infectious disease prevention and control has been the public health priority. Our results suggest that mortality attributable to blood pressure is the major public health challenge and argue for shifting of public health priority and resources towards prevention and control of hypertension. Prompt action will save millions of lives each year.”

In a supplementary note, Professor Stephen MacMahon, The George Institute, University of Sydney, Australia, and Professor Lijing Yan, The George Institute China, Peking University Health Science Center, Beijing, China, call attention to the importance of the recently established Global Alliance for Chronic Disease and the new China Rural Health Initiative in helping China’s battle with chronic disease. They highlight the significance of the use of cheap intervention packages that can reach all of China. These include reduced sodium cooking salt and low cost treatments including generic antihypertensive drugs.

According to a report published in the journal Pediatrics, 1 in every 91 children aged between 3 and 17 years is estimated to have an autism spectrum disorder in the United States. This is over 50% higher than the current 1 in 150 estimated prevalence.

Lee Grossman, CEO, Autism Society, USA, said “This national study charts a dramatic rise in the prevalence of autism in the United States and we applaud this administration’s recognition that autism is an urgent public health priority. But families today are asking: how high must these prevalence rates rise before the nation responds? Significant resources must be directed toward screening and diagnosis, affordable interventions that treat the whole person and comprehensive education plans to foster lifelong skill development so that people with autism will have the ability to work and live independently.”

The report was conducted by the Department of Health and Human Services National Survey of Children’s health. Data was gathered from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), and 78,000 parents were telephoned. The study determined that 110 out of every 10,000 respondents reported having a child with an autism spectrum disorder.

The Autism Society said that the increasing numbers have long-term economic costs to the USA, as autism is a chronic (long-term) condition that affects an individual throughout his/her life.

Grossman said “Lifespan services, particularly for adults, are typically inadequate and inappropriate. This new data should be a call to action to the government to improve and increase services and supports first.”

Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), said “The information in this new report highlights the pressing need for additional services, support and treatments for families affected by autism spectrum disorders. My bill, the Autism Treatment Acceleration Act, will help children and adults with autism gain better access to coordinated services, improve training for professionals treating these disorders, and will relieve the financial burden on the millions of families struggling with this disability.”

If the bill is approved it would provide funding for research into effective treatments and interventions, the first demonstration grants on adult services, create and adult prevalence study, and fund family support and information networks.

Congressman Mike Doyle (D-PA), co-chair of the Congressional Autism Caucus, said “Autism affects millions of American families, and the cost of diagnosis, early intervention, and treatment imposes a heavy burden on most of them. This legislation, the Autism Treatment Acceleration Act of 2009, would improve the dissemination of information between autism researchers and service providers, improve training for professionals treating autism spectrum disorders, and mandate that health insurers cover the diagnosis and treatment of autism spectrum disorders. Enactment of this legislation would do a lot to help millions of American families.”

Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), co-chair of the Congressional Autism Caucus, said “The increase in the reported prevalence of autism across the nation testifies to the urgency of executing a comprehensive strategy in response to this public health emergency. For its part, Congress must ensure robust funding to support aggressive programs of research, education, and services. Furthermore, Congress needs to enact additional legislation, such as the Autism Treatment Acceleration Act of 2009, that will establish the infrastructure and mechanisms for delivering appropriate services across the lifespan to individuals with autism and their families. We must look to maximize the reach and impact of our investments and activities by closely coordinating government efforts with those of national advocacy organizations, such as the Autism Society.”

What is autism?

Autism is known as a complex developmental disability. Experts believe that Autism presents itself during the first three years of a person’s life. The condition is the result of a neurological disorder that has an effect on normal brain function, affecting development of the person’s communication and social interaction skills. People with autism have issues with non-verbal communication, a wide range of social interactions, and activities that include an element of play and/or banter.